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DUTIES OF DAILY LIFE

Life is not entirely made up of great evils or heavy trials; but the perpetual recurrence of petty evils and small trials is the ordinary and appointed exercise of the Christian graces. To bear with the failings of those about us—with their infirmities, their bad judgment, their ill-breeding, their perverse tempers—to endure neglect when we feel we deserve attention, and ingratitude where we expected thanks; to bear with the company of disagreeable people whom Providence has placed in our way and whom he has provided on purpose for the trial of our virtue, these are the best exercises of patience and self-denial, and the better because not chosen by ourselves. To bear with vexation in business, with disappointment in our expectations, with interruptions of our retirement, with folly, intrusions, disturbance—in short, with whatever opposes our will or contradicts our humor—this habitual acquiescence appears to be more of the essence of self-denial than any little rigors or afflictions of our own imposing. These constant, inevitable, but inferior evils properly improved, furnish a good moral discipline.—Selected.

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— June, 1884 —